The Adoration of Jenna Fox, by Mary E. Pearson

After waking from a year-long coma, Jenna Fox is lucky to be alive. She is seventeen, although the only reason she knows this is because her family has told her so. She can’t remember her friends, yet she has no problem reciting Thoreau’s Walden word for word. She has been told she hates history, but can rattle off details concerning the California earthquake that happened years before she was born. Her mother is strangely overprotective, as though Jenna might shatter before her very eyes. As Jenna starts to venture farther from home, gaining more and more independence, she starts to question everything. Why can’t she remember her past?

As Mary Pearson expertly unfolds the story, readers are teased with hints as to why Jenna may be in this particular situation. She remembers bits and pieces as she becomes more independent and reaches farther from her parents’ protective wraps. We find out why exactly they are so sheltering and wonder at the lengths they went to for those protective measures.

Carefully crafting a coming-of-age tale, a little futuristic technology, and questions of moral ethics, Pearson will keep you on the edge of your seat until the last page. And even then, you’ll still want to know more about Jenna Fox. This novel also is also a great selection as an audio book. In fact, that is how I started it, but I couldn’t wait to find out what was going to happen. I knew I could read faster than the narrator could talk and switched to the print version. Either way, The Adoration of Jenna Fox will make you stop and think about family dynamics, the future of science, and the independence we all develop.